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American Princess #BriFri

Welcome to British Isles Friday! British Isles Friday is a weekly event for sharing all things British and Irish — reviews, photos, opinions, trip reports, guides, links, resources, personal stories, interviews, and research posts. Join us each Friday to link your British and Irish themed content and to see what others have to share. The link list is at the bottom of this post. Pour a cup of tea or lift a pint and join our link party!

Last week, I had some fun with Pride and Prejudice, including dreaming about the house that “played” Longbourne in the series. Tina reviewed Gone for Lunch, an advice book by an event planner who works for the Museum of London so she has lots of interesting options at lunch. Becky reviewed The War I Finally Won, a coming-of-age WWII story.

The news from early in the week was fun for American Anglophiles. My favorite headline, though, appealed to my feminism: Successful actress Meghan Markle to wed former soldier. I haven’t paid much attention to the romances of Prince Harry, so this was a nice surprise for me.

Did you catch the BBC interview with Prince Harry and Meghan Markle? It seems that Meghan Markle wasn’t an American Anglophile before meeting Prince Harry, since she didn’t know much about him before then. Prince Harry wasn’t a previous fan of her work in the TV series, Suits. They both considered it a blessing — two famous people who didn’t know too much about it each other before they met. I can imagine that being a relief to get to know someone without a lot of media baggage to unload first.

From the interview, Meghan Markle understands what she’s getting into. Marrying into the royal family is marrying into a family business. It’s a marriage and a career-change in one moment. But, she seems prepared for that, now.

I had a fun time, this week, mostly for purposes of my novel but also to indulge in a little royal-watching, studying this map from The Daily Mail of the residents of Kensington Palace.

Meghan Markle will join Prince Harry in Nottingham Cottage on the grounds of Kensington Palace.

I love that headline you highlighted too! Although to be honest, I had no idea who Markle was, as I’m not a Suit watcher. She did seem lovely and intelligent and forward thinking in the interview, they both seemed so happy. The whole question of her being a princess brings me back to my childhood when, believe it or not, I had a huge crush on Prince Charles. This makes more sense if you know that I’m 64 years old, born in Britain and still a British subject. Anyway, I told my British mother that I wanted to grow up and marry the Prince. Her response, that I couldn’t marry Charles because I was a ‘commoner’ is how it used to be! At the time, it made me cry.

Not a lot has changed. Meghan won’t technically be a princess, instead, according to experts in the Daily Mirror, she’ll probably be Her Royal Highness Meghan, Duchess of Sussex-the dukedom the queen has reserved for Prince Harry.

Still, I’m sure we’ll think of her as a princess, and a beautiful one at that!

I’m with Sim – except that I had no desire to marry Charles. It’s good to have a good news story and they are a lovely couple; I really hope it works out. I wonder if Trump will be invited to the wedding, having had the cheek to tell our PM what to do?

I thought I’d give you a link to some nice pictures of interesting castles – nothing too taxing! But if you want to know more, click on the photos. This article was inspired by seeing so many similar-looking pieces on various travel sites written by people who had no idea what they were talking about and who had obviously never visited the castles either…